Legend :
"*" = New
"+" = Change
"-" = Fix
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 release candidate 2:
New :
* New IPTV color-highlighting for the playing channel and program
(on channels that support archive playback). You can tweak the
colors in the options dialog.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to hide outdated archive
channel EPG entries that are too old to stream.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface / Playlist) that specifies the
default Playlist Load / Save folder. If nothing is specified, the standard
windows supplied path is used.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface / Playlist) that controls whether
Zoom Player should ask you for a confirmation when you clear the playlist.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface) to control whether text that
has no room to display fully starts scrolling. Currently this only
applies to the main window's title text.
Change :
+ The IPTV EPG files are now loaded and parsed in a background thread. This
means that the interface should open quickly and you can close it even
before the EPG data is finished parsing so the entire interface should
feel faster.
This change should also fix issues caused when Windows thinks Zoom Player's
window has become unresponsive while parsing EPG data (for example, on some
systems I got reports that the IPTV window would lose it's "on top" value).
Fixes :
- Trying to play a video with an external audio track, for example:
"myvideo.mkv" and "myvideo.mp3" in the same folder with the "Load External
Audio tracks" setting enabled, resulted in a lot of instability.
I rewrote the whole interface and now it's much more stable. Please note
that this feature also requires Zoom Player's DSP filter to be enabled
(Adv. Options / Playback / Audio - Enable Internal DSP Filter).
- The Playlist Editor's "Load Playlist" feature accidentally listed media
files instead of playlists by default.
- The Folder Browser dialog should no longer appear partially off-screen or
hidden by the task bar.
- Fixed an IPTV EPG Filtering issue where entering a value into the
filter box and then switching to another channel would make it impossible
to clear the filtering value.
- Under some conditions, the play history fullscreen navigation interface
could show a value of "00:00:-1" for the last play position.
- When using a non-default font, the play history last play position could
mess with the alignment of the file/url.
- IPTV Logo caching from EPG files did not work properly for some entries
based solely on channel name.
- Playing too many broken URLs or files is sequence could have resulted in
play history entries being generated even though nothing was played.
- Reduced the chances of showing IPTV EPG information for the wrong channel
when using badly crafted playlist or EPG sources.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 release candidate 1:
New :
* Opening the IPTV interface for the first time now offers you the option
to automatically download free, child-friendly, publicly available IPTV
channels from around the world through the Free-TV project:
https://github.com/Free-TV/IPTV
* Using the "Play Stream" button on the IPTV interface will no longer try
to play an EPG program and will always try to play the channel live.
* New "Play Program" button on the IPTV interface. The "Play Program"
button is used to play archived IPTV programs. If the channel does not
support archive playback or if the selected program is no longer
(or not yet) archived, the "Play Program" button will remain disabled.
* New "Add Free Channels" button (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) that
adds free, child-friendly, publicly available IPTV channels from around
the world through the Free-TV project.
* You can now control outdated EPG programs background colors
(Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV), making it easier to distinguish
which programs have already aired.
* Support for more IPTV Archive playback schemes (including "Flussonic").
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to specify the symbol
used to highlight archive channels in the IPTV stream list.
Fixes :
- No longer marking IPTV channels as archive if their "catchup-days"
value is "0".
- The Playlist Editor's search box did not support unicode characters.
- You can now use Ctrl+V to paste Unicode text into the Playlist Editor's
search box (including special characters such as Emoji).
- Fixed a bug that could cause Zoom Player to freeze when trying to
play YouTube URLs containing a space character after the URL.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 10:
New :
* Support for IPTV Archive playback. For channels that support it,
double-click the program to start playing it. You can easily identify
Archive supporting channels by the icon next to their name.
There are multiple implementations of IPTV Archive support and I did
my best to make sure all were covered, but if something is not working
as intended, let me know on Zoom Player's sub-reddit.
* New IPTV Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) that clears the
playlist before streaming. This setting is enabled by default,
disabling it adds the channel to the playlist and play it without
clearing the playlist.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface / Playlist) to prevent embedded
playlists (playlist files within playlist files) from loading when
Zoom Player loads a playlist. This setting is enabled by default as
embedded playlist can lead to unfortunate infinite-loops cases and
other stability problems.
Change :
+ Playing media from the Advanced Playlist Control now ensures the newly
played item is visible in the Playlist Editor.
+ I Didn't like the behavior of the new setting (enabled by default)
that automatically hide the control bar when clicking the video area.
What annoyed me was that it was canceling my action, so if I wanted
to pause the video, it would ignore the pause action and just hide
the control bar. Now I adjusted this feature to hide the control bar
and not block the intended action.
Fixes :
- Fixed a bug that caused the IPTV caches to get wiped clear when Zoom
Player was pruning the media library thumbnail and meta-data cache.
- Playing an entry from the Advanced Playlist Control interface no longer
loses the entry's selection.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 9:
New :
* Added a clock to the top of the IPTV's Electronic Program Guide section.
* Added a button to clear the IPTV channel logo cache (Adv. Options /
Playback / IPTV). Clearing the logo cache forces Zoom Player to
re-download the channel icons.
Change :
+ If an IPTV channel doesn't have a logo or ID in the M3U playlist file,
Zoom Player now tries to use an icon from the EPG XML file based
on the channel name (or partial name) and caches the logo so it shows
even if you keep the EPG panel closed.
+ IPTV Stream Channel -> EPG matching by Channel name (when a Channel ID
is not present) now works when the EPG contains multiple channel names
for the same channel.
+ IPTV Stream Channel -> EPG matching by Channel name (when a Channel ID
is not present) now matches even if there is an uppercase/lowercase
mismatch in the name or the EPG contains only a partial name.
+ IPTV Stream Channel -> EPG matching by Channel name is now automatic if
no EPG data was found using the Channel's ID.
+ The IPTV section of the options dialog is now a lot more informative
with regards to the Playlist/EPG download status (or failure).
+ Closing and re-opening the IPTV interface will now maintain the
EPG listing.
Fixes :
- Refreshing the IPTV list after a new Playlist or EPG finished downloading
should now maintain open groups and EPG listing.
- Fixed a bug that prevented some IPTV channel logo from saving properly
and may have even caused the wrong icon to show up for some channels.
- The IPTV Stream list did not display correctly if specifying a DPI value
higher than 100% in Zoom Player's options.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 8:
New :
* New Wakeup on LAN feature (Adv. Options / System) that allows you to
turn on PCs. This feature is extremely useful when using NAS (Network
Attached Storage) devices as your source for the media and you only
want to turn them on when using Zoom Player.
With this new feature, you can specify multiple MAC addresses to wake
several PCs and you can trigger the wake-up action with a choice of
conditions such as:
1. When starting Zoom Player
2. When opening the Media Library
3. When opening the File Navigator
If there are other use-cases where you would want Zoom Player to
wake-up remote PCs, let me know.
* New button on the IPTV Interface to toggle 50% window transparency.
* New IPTV setting to merge duplicate channels. This can be useful
if you're using multiple EPG files/links that contain EPG info
on the same channel.
* New IPTV setting (enabled by default) to keep the IPTV interface
window on top of other windows and applications while Zoom Player
is in fullscreen mode.
* New IPTV setting to control the screen ratio between the stream list
and the EPG. The default value is 1:1.5 (Making the EPG 150% wider
than the stream list).
* If an IPTV channel doesn't have a logo in the M3U playlist file,
Zoom Player now tries to use an icon from the EPG XML file and
caches the logo so it shows even if you keep the EPG panel closed.
Change :
+ To prevent distracting confirmation messages popping up, the IPTV
interface no longer prompts you to update the list once an IPTV M3U
playlist or XML EPG finished downloading, instead it will enable a
refresh button which you can click at your leisure.
+ Enhanced IPTV stream list keyboard navigation.
+ When opening the IPTV interface with the EPG hidden, the EPG data will
not load until the EPG section is opened which results in the IPTV
interface becoming accessible faster.
+ When loading IPTV playlists, if a channel does not contain ID
information, Zoom Player will try to match EPG entries based on
the channel name instead.
+ IPTV channel logos should appear faster if there are broken links in
the M3U playlist file.
+ Closing and opening the IPTV interface window now restores the previously
opened group layout.
Fixes :
- Resizing the IPTV interface window could leave trails on screen until
the stream list was scrolled.
- Right clicking a history entry and selecting "copy" in the playback
history interface returned a jumble result when copying links.
- The scroll bar on the description section of the IPTV program information
dialog accessible by right-clicking an EPG program did not show/hide
properly based on the window size.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 7:
New :
* You can now easily multiply Zoom Player's windowed skin resolution
from the skin selection dialog (press "N" to open) to better match
Zoom Player's skin to your monitor's resolution.
* You can now time-shift IPTV channels in the EPG by right-clicking an
EPG entry.
* New IPTV Safe mode setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) that
blocks access to Hiding Groups, Adding/Modifying favorites and
EPG Time Shifting.
Change :
+ Zoom Player will load slightly faster when using a multiplied
resolution skin.
+ Zoom Player's title text now scrolls if there is no room to show
the entire text.
Fixes :
- Filtering the media library by Genre stopped working.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 6:
New :
* This feature has been requested by many. The ability to scale
Zoom Player's skinned windows to make them easier to use on
4K and 8K displays:
New Setting (Adv. Options / System) that allows you to resize
the current windowed skin by 200-800%. Please note that this
setting may not work well with some older Zoom Player skins.
* New button added to the IPTV interface that allows you to toggle
the EPG display on and off.
* New IPTV setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to hide old EPG
entries (programs that have already aired).
* New Search feature in the media library category editor.
Change :
+ Redesigned the media library category editor layout. Hopefully it's
clearer and easier to work with.
+ Pressing ESC with the player window in focus now closes the IPTV
interface window.
+ Pressing ESC now closes the "Patterns" interface instead of having
to cycle through every pattern.
Fixes :
- You can no longer set an IPTV program start notification or switching
to the live stream if the EPG entry is older than the current time
(has already finished airing).
- The IPTV notification message before a program starts will now remain
visible for several more seconds.
- Loading M3U playlists containing links to other M3U playlists, no
longer tries to insert the embedded playlists as part of the loaded
playlists, which can cause many unforeseen issues.
- Loading some M3U playlists in the playlist editor did not always show
the media's title.
- Opening a stream from the IPTV interface in fullscreen mode would hide
the IPTV interface in the background behind the video window.
- Under some conditions, the "Add Folder to Category" and "Remove Folder"
buttons in the media library category editor were enabled for Plugin
based categories which would have allowed you to mess up these categories
if you were not careful.
- When adding a new plugin based Media Library category, you can no
longer add duplicate entries even after renaming the category.
- In the media library category editor, you could press the "Remove Folder"
button when selecting the "Folders:" entry instead of an actual folder.
- Trying to use Ctrl+V to paste a search term into the playlist editor's
search field would result in "????" when trying to paste unicode
characters or emoji.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 5:
New :
* You can now select IPTV streams as favorites and they automatically
show up under a "Favorites" group at the start of the stream list.
You can right click a favorite stream to re-arrange or sort your
favorites list or simply remove the stream from the favorites section.
* You can now hide IPTV groups from being listed by right-clicking the
group and selecting "Hide Group" or through the options dialog.
* Right-clicking an IPTV EPG entry will now show the program's description
and allow you to set a notification to remind you that the program is
about to start as well as specify that you want to automatically switch
to the program's stream in due time.
Notifications are remembered even if you close and re-open Zoom Player,
but they will not activate if Zoom Player is not running.
* New Hidden IPTV Group controls (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV).
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface / Control Bar / Timeline Area)
that allows you to control whether the timeline displays the current
playlist track number.
You can also toggle this setting through the control bar menu by
right-clicking the timeline with nothing playing (or middle-clicking
if something is playing).
* The Advanced Playlist Control interface is now accessible through the
right-click menu under the "Open Interface" section.
Change :
+ Optimized EPG parsing, improving load time by 5-15%.
+ The playlist editor's search feature has been enhanced to support
repeated search. Simply press Enter to cycle between all entries that
contain the searched term.
+ The Station Manager window now has an "X" in the corner to close the
window (previously you had to click the "close" button).
Fixes :
- The Media Libary's category editor's "Playlist" category option did
not display categories correctly if they had certain unicode characters
in the name (e.g. Emojis).
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 4:
New :
* The IPTV auto-updating EPG and Stream List downloads can now handle
".zip" and ".gz" archive URLs (e.g. "https://website.com/epg.zip").
* New Filter EPG feature on the IPTV interface.
* New IPTV setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) that controls the
EPG font size.
* New IPTV setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to control whether
the EPG filter checks program description or only the program's title.
* New "Custom Action" button on the main window (near the top-left) that
allows you to set any standard Zoom Player function to the button.
By default this button opens the new IPTV interface.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Interface) that allows you to assign a
function to the new "Custom Action" button.
Fixes :
- The IPTV interface should feel a bit smoother (less flickering).
- In the media library's category editor, specifying a category name
containing unicode characters would not highlight the entry in
the category list after clicking.
- Media Title containing certain unicode characters (e.g. emoji) did
not show when loading some playlist formats (m3u, asx, b4s, wpl).
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 3:
New :
* The IPTV interface now supports automatically downloading stream lists
and electronic program guide URLs every specified number of days.
* IPTV Stream icons are now downloaded automatically.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) allowing you to control the
Stream's icon size.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) allowing you to control
whether the Stream's text is resized along with the icon size.
* New Setting (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to ignore grouping and just
display the entire stream list.
* New Settings (Adv. Options / Playback / IPTV) to customize the IPTV
interface with your own color scheme.
Change :
+ If an IPTV stream list contains mixed information with some streams
lacking a group specification, all such streams will now show under
an "Unspecified" group. If only one or no groups are specified,
grouping is disabled automatically.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 2:
New :
* A completely new IPTV (streaming live TV and VOD) interface (Adv. Options
/ Playback / IPTV) with support for EPG (Electronic Program Guide),
Channel Grouping and many customization options.
Some features (icons, automated EPG/M3U downloads, etc) are still a work
in progress and are not part of this beta.
* New setting (enabled by default) to automatically hide the control bar
when clicking the video area, making it much easier to quickly hide
the control bar.
* You can now edit the last play time and date directly from the media
library meta-data editor.
Fixes :
- Using unicode characters in the ISO Auto-Mount command would not save
the path properly after restarting Zoom Player.
- The Advanced Options "System Sounds" and "Audio" sections did not scroll
smoothly when using the scroll bar.
--- What's new in Zoom Player v18 beta 1:
New :
* Two new settings (Adv. Options / Interface / Fullscreen Navigation /
Customization) that allow you to override the poster image and backdrop
for Movies and TV show categories.
The backdrop setting is an easy override, just place a "backdrop.jpg" or
"fanart.jpg" in the same folder and Zoom Player will use it automatically.
Updating a movie poster image requires you enable the "Do not use scraped
image as thumbnail / backdrop" setting for each of the media library's TV
or Movie categories, otherwise the poster image will still use the scraped
image (due to image-caching maintaining a copy of the old image) and then
re-scrape the movie folder.
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